[PRCo] 700s to Trafford

[Fred Schneider]

Because railfans have a propensity to take cars where they don't
normally go, I think the fact that there were several fantrips over the
Irwin line with 700s and one as far as Larimer is reasonably concrete
evidence that they didn't normally go there.  Early cars on Irwin were
the PMG 100-104  ... Kuhlman-built cars with platforms at each end.
Once West Penn got control, the 1902 Stephenson 200s were probably most
common ... I would suspect 400s in the summer at least in the earlier
years.  The 200s stayed there until the 286-297 series were put into
service in 1939-1940.

Now lets throw out one more question.  What happened to the PMG Kuhlman
cars?  The five cars were built in March 1906 and the local newspapers
claim they were assigned to Irwin - Greensburg - Hunker service on PMG.
They appear in early several postal cards of the area.
The last picture I've seen shows one derailed at Straw Pump in August
1910.   We know the Pittsburgh, McKeesport and Greensburg property went
to the West Penn -- it disappeared into WP in the 1917 reorganization.
But those Kuhlman cars vanished much earlier.  They were 12-window cars,
roughly similar to the 14 window West Penn 601-606 group.  Principal
difference ... the 100s were all wood and thus had truss rods to support
the body; the 600s were semi-steel.  The 100s were semi-convertibles,
the 600s were fully closed cars.  By the way, Ed and I looked through
the Wheeling roster on the hunch that they might have pawned them off on
a subordinate, and didn't find them.